Popular People's Front of Texas

Rep. Beverly "Splitter" Woolley: Conservative enough for the Tea Party Caucus, but not for Empower Texans, it seems

With everyone to the right of Lon Burnam daubing themselves with the conservative tag, it's kinda lost all meaning. So now Empower Texans is the ultimate arbiter of real conservativosity, deriding even hardcore GOPer Rep. Beverly Woolley, R-Houston, as a secret RINO.

In a blog post written just before the holidays called Yoo-hoo, Beverly Woolley, Empower Texans writer David Smith told the Republican that "You were never a conservative in the first place!"

Someone tell the Senate's self-appointed voice of all things conservative Sen. Dan Patrick, R-Houston, who just made Woolley co-chair of his Tea Party Caucus.

The reason for the scorn? Earlier that day, Woolley announced she was pledging to support Speaker Joe Straus. Since Empower Texans has been leading the charge against Straus as the embodiment of everything they hate in the Legislature, they decided to emulate the People's Front of Judea from Monty Python and the Life of Brian, yelling "Splitters!" at anyone that fails their orthodoxy test.

As for Woolley, it was time to rewrite some history – or at least change the standards – since the only screaming going on around here is not her alleged liberalism, but coming straight from the contorted logic Smith applies. Apparently, getting a 78% ranking on Empower Texans' legislative score card for the 81st session makes her a liberal and, as Smith says, "only liberals like Straus."

And how liberal is Woolley? Well, since she's most famous for killing a minimum wage bill in 2007, proposing "God Bless Texas" license plates in 2003 and acting as a fund-raising foot soldier for convicted felon Tom DeLay's TRMPAC in 2002, we're not anticipating a switch to the Socialist Workers Party any time soon.